Evenings

I need to get this one off my chest.

My DD will feed pretty constantly, with 10 mins breaks in the evenings. Tonight she's feed at 6.30 and from 7.15, with two 10 mins breaks till 9pm. She's tired so I feed in her room with the lights off and put in the cot during 10 min breaks.She's 4 1/2 months but was 1 month premmie.

She's not a great eater at other times, so I try and go with it listening to the radio with headphones on etcv to give myself something to do. I have had no luck getting her to take a bottle, (she gags and refuses to drink) so that's out of the question. She won't settle for the night until she is full, but when she is she goes to sleep straight away and either wakes once or sleeps through.

It probably sounds selfish, but sometimes I really struggle with not being able to do anything on my evenings. I can't organise to go anywhere, as I'm never sure when she'll go to sleep and nobody else can feed her...and after that feeding period, i'm tired. I'm get the feeling that some bottle feeding mums and my child free friends think I'm being over protective etc.

I thought about filling her up more during the day by if she's not hungry she refuses to drink.

Does anyone else have something similiar? Will she grow out of it? I'm so hoping I'm not doing this for another year.

I keep telling myself that its only a short time in my life, but missing family weddings, and having to feed through Xmas dinner doesn't sound like much fun.

Yeah i also think she will grow out of it. I can understand how hard it is though, with each baby I didn't feel normal until I got my evenings back, everything does seem better once you can have a few baby free hours.

With the bottle if you are keen on going that route, have you tried different nipples? they all have different flow rates so she might just need one that is slower and you get ones that are suppose to feel more like nipples.

Does she take a dummy? some of the bottle nipples you can get are shaped like dummies so one of those might work as well.

It will get better, honestly, and you are right when you say it is such a short time because it really really is. My youngest is coming up to 1 and I don't know where the year has gone

lots of babies go through a stage of having a feeding frenzy in the evenings. it is very normal and will change. Dont hide yourself away tho, feeling isolated isnt good for new mums.

Libby was exactly the same until about 5 months - my midwife got me right from the beginning to express after my morning feed and top her up with this at night - she would breast feed at about 5.30 then she would have her bottle at about 6.15 and then she would breast feed again at about 7 - 7.30 before going to bed worked a treat as DH would spend this time with her while I cooked dinner and it gave my boobs a chance to refill lol

first wrote: I don't have too many suggestions on how to change her behavior other than riding it out cause it sounds like she needs it but I wanted to say don't be afraid to take her to the family dinner and just feed her while you eat. Its only one night and you need to have a little enjoyment too.

Totally agree, my DD did the same as yours. She's great now, I just persisted with the BF, and learned to eat one handed!

Thanks all great advice. I think things are starting to improve. She chomping thru a bit faster and actually sleeping for a while between evening feeds. So hopefully on Thursday I be able to have most of chirstmas dinner with the family. 8.20 and she's been down for an hour!

I have also tired leaving it as long as I can before feeding her in her room, which is helping me heaps.

I have tried about 4 different types of bottle, tommy tippee, infantil, one for the hospital and another one, she will suck but gags on all of them. This baby is a BF advocate. Bit of bummer, as you get told that bottle feeding is so easy!